EcoHack: World Parks Congress Edition

It’s no secret – our planet’s in trouble. But we believe that technology is revolutionizing the way we tackle some of the biggest problems facing earth: climate change, food security, conservation and sustainable development.

For over three years now, we've been building tools, creating visualizations, and telling stories about our environment and the science that helps us understand and protect it. EcoHack is our attempt to bring together a diverse community of scientists, hackers, designers and others who want to tell those stories with us.

This EcoHack takes place alongside the World Parks Congress, the landmark, once-a-decade global forum focused on the world’s wildernesses. So while leaders convene at the Congress to inspire solutions to conservation, we want to start building those solutions together.

And for the second time, EcoHack will be a global event, with simultaneous hackathons in Sydney, Nairobi, New York City, Madrid, Cambridge, U.K, Washington, D.C and San Francisco. From the start in Sydney until the end in San Francisco, this hackathon will run for nearly 50 consecutive hours!

Resources

Need some tools or data? Not sure what to work on? Check out our resources doc for info about great tools and data from sponsors, as well as links to a few interesting data sets and resources across the web. Need inspiration for a talk? Check out project pitch presentations:

What is EcoHack?

EcoHack is about using technology to improve and better understand our natural environment, creating things that will have an impact, with no restrictions on how you get there.

In the past, EcoHack has hosted everything from creating data visualizations to building kites. We've seen people crack open a scientific database of plant species and we've seen people try build maps to help share news about forest loss. The format is flexible, the outcomes are meaningful, and the weekend is fun!

Who is this for?

If you're interested in the environment, technology, or both, EcoHack is for you! Do you have some interesting data to share? Are you a crack web developer, mapping expert, or data visualization guru? EcoHack brings together scientists, technologists, and environmental enthusiasts.
You don't have to be in science or tech to participate. Seriously! We need your ideas, domain expertise, and feedback on what gets built. All are welcome.

2014 IUCN World Parks Congress

This year the IUCN World Parks Congress will convene the world’s leaders to discuss original approaches to conservation and development. Focusing on the theme “Parks, People, Planet: inspiring solutions” the event will explore the role conservation plays in addressing challenges from water security to deforestation to human health.

At EcoHack, we plan to support the work of anyone trying to better communicate, understand and defend the world’s protected areas. We will prioritize some of the best land, forest and biodiversity-related hacks to include at our global events. If you have a protected areas related project, we strongly encourage you to submit your idea using this form. We will support these hacks and help teams find resources to continue development after EcoHack weekend.

Have a project?

Want to bring an exciting new project or idea to EcoHack? Make sure it's related to the environment and has clear goals that can be achieved in a single day. Like we said, we especially welcome projects with a focus on protected areas! Feel free to email us or tweet us (@EcoHackGlobal) if you want to discuss your idea before the hack.

Follow EcoHack

If you can’t make it to one of our hacks you can still watch the hack unfold. Follow the @EcoHackGlobal twitter account, or check one of the links below to see what’s going on at your local hack:

SUNDAY. 9:30AM-8PM Hacking with data

This is an unconference, which means that after the Ignite talks on Saturday we will divide into small groups on Sunday and actually work on solutions.

Bring your laptop, hardware, balloons, and data and be ready to hack. At the end of the day we all come back together to show off our results.

Saturday we will meet for pizza at 6:30PM with talks starting at 7:15PM. Afterward, we'll go out for beers, get to know each other, and talk about project plans. Sunday we'll start at 9:30AM and finish around 8:30PM - just in time for more beers nearby. Food and drinks will be provided.